When you say you're doing an opera, it's like when you're a seven-year-old and say, 'I'm off to Washington, Dad.' You kind of go, 'Sure. Sure you are, son.'
Tom WaitsIf you can make a little painting for the ears with a few words, well, I like words; I like cutting them up and finding different ways of saying the same thing... I get into a spell, and it all comes easy. I don't labor over it. I go inside the song, I think you make yourself an antenna for songs, and songs want to be around you. And then they bring other songs along, and then they're all sitting around, and they're drinkin' your beer, and they're sleeping on the floor. And they are using the phone, they're rude, thankless little f---ers.
Tom WaitsIn terms of black music - the only music that we can call our own, that was really born here - I don't think a lot has been done to chronicle the relations between American history and where black music fits in.
Tom WaitsI think all songs should have weather in them. Names of towns and streets, and they should have a couple of sailors. I think those are just song prerequisites.
Tom WaitsThey have removed the struggle to find anything. And therefore there is no genuine sense of discovery. Struggle is the first thing we know getting along the birth canal, out in the world. It's pretty basic. Book store owners and record store owners used to be oracles, in that way; you'd go in this dusty old place and they might point you toward something that would change your life. All that's gone.
Tom Waits